


Hungry

by artemisgrace



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Denial, Denial of Feelings, Falling In Love, Internal Conflict, Internal Monologue, Love, M/M, conflicted feelings, homoerotic wine drinking, hunger as a theme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 21:37:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19472701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artemisgrace/pseuds/artemisgrace
Summary: Will wishes that his feelings about Hannibal were more straight-forward . . . and revels in the conflict.





	Hungry

Will and Hannibal speak frequently, often for hours upon hours at a time, and yet, in a peculiar way, very little of import is said. Many words spoken, many things implied, inferred, and pondered upon, many metaphors exchanged, all of which laden with meaning, but statements of direct communication are few and far between. Everything a dance around the truth of things, a slow, spinning waltz around verity. 

Those things which are most significant spill out entirely by accident. The spill from their lips in an unguarded moment, upon wine-stained breath, or they simply tumble out through the cracks in between the words.

There are things left unspoken that would be simply unwise to say aloud, whether for the risk of surveillance or the fear of the lingering, simmering anger that such words could bring to the surface. And then, in contrast, there are the things that go unsaid out of the belief that giving them voice, that cramming sentiments into inadequate little words, would cheapen them. Hannibal in particular seems to subscribe to that philosophy, expressing his affection by waxing poetic about the works of Botticelli, about blood and pain, opining about the very nature of the human soul. About God.

So much spoken, so much revealed, and yet the most basic of truths remain obscured as if through a thin curtain of gauze, caged in the throat and not allowed flight, for fear that once free, the meaning will dissipate, leaving behind only the empty shell of a word without significance. “I love you” and “I hate you” can’t hope to contain even a fraction of the sentiment they wish to convey, so they revel instead in purgatory, in between worlds, in between words.

It can be frustrating, but at the same time, there is something so appropriate, so deeply right, about living in a purgatory all their own and of their own making, two lost souls wandering the endless fields together . . . Steeped in blood and untruths as they are, it’s likely the best of what they deserve. 

Will watches in thoughtful silence as Hannibal pours them each a glass of wine, deep red, gleaming like liquid ruby in the warm glow from the fireplace, and turns to look at Will with eyes that seem, in firelight, to be almost as red as the wine. He stalks forward with a predator’s grace, but his eyes are nothing but adoring, a shine to them as he passes Will a glass and watches a bit too attentively as Will takes a long, savoring sip. 

His dark eyes linger upon Will’s mouth, taking in the crimson stain of wine on Will’s lips, and Will knows, somewhere deep in the core of him, that Hannibal is imagining the red of wine to be the red of blood. Perhaps the blood of an enemy vanquished together, or perhaps . . . Perhaps Hannibal imagines the blood in Will’s mouth to be his own, for however much Hannibal has wanted to be the devourer, there’s a vicious, desperate part of him that wants to be the one devoured, so long as it’s Will’s teeth that do it, Will's jaws that drag him into oblivion. Hannibal is a creature made of hunger, and he hungers, in some amount, for practically everything, even for deprivation and pain.

His tastes, of course, are very specific; there are things he’ll tolerate only from the most exclusive of sources . . . but if it’s Will doing the depriving, if it’s Will inflicting the pain, then Hannibal is on the verge of ravenous. It’s a hard thing to know, to have swimming in his head while sipping wine in Hannibal’s study after the fall of night, a hard thing to see in Hannibal’s hungry eyes as the man watches him drink, observing the bob of his throat as though regarding a classical painting.

It’s a hard thing, to be the focus of all that hunger . . . and it’s even harder to tamp down the answering hunger that threatens to rise within himself. Everything is indulgence and denial, one after the other, washing in and out like tides. And it’s harder yet when Will can’t be sure if the hunger in himself is truly his, or if it’s but a reflection in the mirror of his mind . . . He’d like to think it something of that nature, something less real, but the way that this gnawing desire claws at the inside of his chest tells him that it’s unlikely to be an adopted feeling. The sensation is just far too raw . . . 

It hurts and it doesn’t; it stings and it seduces . . .

Hannibal smiles at him, as if he knows, as if he can sense the hunger around him like phantom limbs, all hunger somehow his own . . . but he doesn’t say so. It’s that thing again, the knowledge that words cannot suffice, and that trying to wedge the emotion into words is a fruitless endeavor.

Hannibal smiles at him and it stings like lemon in a cut that Will doesn’t even have to try to smile back. It shouldn’t come this easy, not after every terrible thing that the man has done, but love is overpowering by nature, a consuming beast, devouring reason and righteousness, swallowing all sense . . . 

Oh, but love is such a hungry thing.

**Author's Note:**

> How'd you like it? Feel free to drop by the comments to let me know your thoughts :)


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